Our classes have already started and the students are learning to make a big circle, they've learnt to respond to "sit down" and "stand up" with little promping. The youngest ones are learning the difference between "hello" and "bye bye" and the older ones are being introduced to ways of asking and responding to "how are you".
Specific content for older students has revolved around reviewing and increasing vocabulary related to numbers and colours. This will form the basis of table work in the form of worksheets and crafts later on.
Below are some of the songs we've been singing and doing TPR (total physical response) actions to.
One Little Finger - 1
Counting Cookies - 1- 4
How Many fingers? . 1-5
Seven Steps - old
Seven Steps - new
Numbers counting to ten - 1- 10
Counting Bananas: 1-20
Count and Move: 1-20
WORKSHEETS Colour the number of clothes (1 - one coat).
These songs are great for introducing and reviewing key vocabulary. I usually start with CDs first to develop their listening skills. The videos are mainly for reinforcement. We also play games around these songs. One game involves the use of number cards. Each child is given a number and when a number is called, the child with that number must stand up or sit down.
Establishing routines at the beginning of the school year helps you to avoid problems later on. Children are never too young to learn appropriate behaviour in any given situation. Following are some ideas for establishing routines and sticking with them thus allowing the class to run smoothly and enabling children to learn basic and simple classroom language in the target language, English.
I use a lot of songs from the Super Simple Songs collection. One of the first things I do is teach them to make a circle as a lot of what we will do will require this type of spacial organisation. I prefer using the audio versions exclusively at first as I want the children to become accustomed to listening to English and picking up on English sounds and key words. This is essential for being able to give and have them follow, simple instructions like "make a (big/small) circle"; "sit down" or "stand up".
This is a very simple "Hello" song which I usually use with younger children or when I'm just starting to work with a class. It allows them to learn to say "hello" as well as some basic actions like, "clap your hands" and "stamp your feet". It also keeps them calm and makes class control easier.
With my older students, once I know them a bit better and we've established routines and boundaries, I usually introduce them to a livelier hello song.
Hello! How are you?
This song extends language related to greetings. Children learn to ask and respond to "How are you?
If you prefer to slow things down a bit, the following song is a good option and it also allows one to introduce older children to simple text in English which is something they would have to start working with in Year 1 (at least in the Spanish school system). Once students have been doing lots of auditory work (listening and singing songs whilst doing TPR-type actions to learn vocabulary), they watch this video.
Hello. How are you?
Goodbye
Goodbye songs signal the end of the lesson. The following song has multiple uses: when introducing the number 1; when teaching parts of the body; when calming children down if they've become a bit restless and to say goodbye.
Finally, the following is a really good song to teach children to say goodbye and calm them down at the same time so that they're ready to go into their going-home routine (putting on coats, getting bags, making a line, etc.). It's also a good way of connecting with the "Hello, Hello" song.
The idea exists that teaching very young children is really easy. Over the years, I've taught every school-going age from 3 to 18 (and beyond) and I can tell you that this is definitely NOT the case. After working with children ages 3 to 5, I really take my hat off to pre-school or Infant-level teachers.
After only a few years of experience with very young ESL learners and not having any natural talent for teaching at Infant level, I certainly can't claim to be an expert. However, given that I've had to learn techniques to be able to first of all work adequately with young children and secondly, to be able to capture their attention enough for them to want to learn English, I think some of the ideas that I will share on this blog may actually be of use to teachers who, like me, find themselves teaching age groups that they're not completely familiar or even comfortable with.
First of all, most students at this age who attend regular schools with just one hour of English per week (90 minutes at the most), are merely being introduced to the language. Most have little if any knowledge of English, The youngest ones are just starting school and everything is new (and in some cases, even scary) to them. The focus should therefore be on making their introduction to English fun and stress-free while building upon and reinforcing, where possible, what they are learning with their class teachers.
I've chosen not to use textbooks at all even though they're readily available and textbooks salespeople are constantly popping up trying to sell schools their company's books. I find textbooks at these levels to be an unnecessary waste of time and money. That said however, it is completely understandable that many teachers who have not had any experience working with these levels prefer using them. They provide structure and sorely-needed guidance in the teaching process. It is better to follow a textbook with the complementary materials that come with them (flashcards, CDs, puppets, etc.) rather than stumbling through an entire school year without having any idea of what you should be doing with your young students
My structure and guidance will come from the textbooks that students will be using to develop general knowledge and skills (home, school, language, routines, basic hygiene, festivals, etc.). When they learn about home, for example, I will identify appropriate vocabulary to focus on in class through songs, games, videos and flashcards.
Resources will be culled from the large collection of ESL teaching materials piled up in the English cupboard over the years. Included are sample books sent by publishing companies, puppets left from previous years when textbooks were used by the teachers who came before me, flashcards, teacher-made resources left behind, and so on. In order to create some continuity, I've been taking the puppet from the Project used during the last year or two to my classes. When I walked into the classrooms on my first day with the 4 and 5-year olds, the students immediately recognised him and some even remembered his name, Dex. Dex is an English-speaking dinosaur who will interact with the class puppets who only speak Spanish. Some ideas that I've been developing around the use of these puppets are the following:
- Introduce very short formulaic dialogues (Hello - How are you - I'm fine thank you, and you? / What's your name? - I'm Dex.)
- Focus on English sounds through mispronunciation (use English pronunciation for the names of the Spanish puppets through humorous dialogue where the Spanish puppets will get frustrated - in Spanish of course - at Dex's inability to say their names correctly)
- Resolve problems that may occur in class by having the Spanish puppets give short humorous explanations thus allowing both the teacher (me) and Dex to use English
Other materials that I plan on recycling and incorporating into my classes are flashcards and big books with very simple stories and big, bright pictures.
I won't be using any of the CDS that come with the Projects previously used as I have ESL songs that are far better and can be found on the internet so that parents who are interested can have their children watch them at home. There are many really good websites with educational songs on the internet but my favourite one by far is SUPERSIMPLELEARNING which also has a playlist and CDS that you can order on the internet. I have their first three CDS which include many traditional English songs adapted to the ESL context. I will be selecting songs according to whatever theme the children are working on at any given time. Other really good songs can be found at KIDSTV123 where one can also find songs for older students and BUSY BEAVERS which includes the calendar song (which I really love) so that children can learn the days of the week and the months of the year.
Finally, I will use the occasional worksheet as the general textbook being used by my students actually includes some for English classes though these are simple enough to make and once again, many good ones can be found on the internet (SUPERSIMPLELEARNING for example has worksheets related to some of the songs on the website).
This is the first time I'll be attempting to work without a textbook at this level so I'll probably have to make much of my own resources. I've already made a set of numbers for my five-year-olds to learn the numbers song (Count and Move) below:
Well, I hope you've found this interesting. I'll keeping posting ideas and experiences from my ESL very young learners classes.
